Slave villages in Nevis and St Kitts

Slave villages represent an important but little-known part of the Caribbean landscape. Since abandonment, their locations have been forgotten and in many cases leave no trace above ground. As they are virtually invisible on the landscape today, village locations are particularly liable to destruction or development, unlike the more substantial stone constructed houses of the European plantation owners. However, they are integral in creating a direct link between past and present because villages represent the homes of the ancestors of many modern people in the islands today.

St Kitts is probably the only island in the West Indies that has a map showing the location of all the slave villages. William McMahon's map drawn in 1828 records shows the landscape of plantation estates shortly before emancipation, after nearly three centuries of development.

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